"As I walk into the shadow of the valley of death, I shall fear no evil". Evil is a subjective term to call for this game. It deals with the unknown, and asks anybody who dwells into its radioactive grave about what people would do if their curiosities got the worst of them.
It's also about driving a car in a post-apocalyptic zone full of cosmic wonders with no one alive. Like the ideas teeming with inspired concepts from Roadside Picnic, as if playing Outer Wilds in a Stalker game. Upgrading my car, navigating through the road against hazardous entities and environmental effects. I mean, we're talking radioactive storms, floating objects, and tarmac deep carving wheels.
It has its problems, some inconsistent enough, but it's so intriguing to drive, not even have those issues bother me anytime. As of writing now, I still want to go back. It gets more and more profound, more stressful, challenging, intriguing, and progressively more fun as I continue.
It's 1998, a few short years from the next millennium led me to a town that has been a social experiment for the Olympic Exclusion Zone since the 1940s. Pretty much almost everything is irregular behavior, there's warping, floating objects, radioactive clouds, and so on.
Nothing that crazy for a smooth driving to a closed off location, up until a portal sucks me in and just disassembled my car, leaving me stranded out of nowhere. Though, it was clear that I was now inside, and people started talking to me on the radio. Wait, what radio? My car is gone.
It's never explained exactly who I am, so just my default, I am going to assume I am just someone who was tasked into coming here for research purposes. So as am on the path, I found a hunkered station wagon that looking like a complete wreck, took it for a drive after putting its wheel back. Then being guided to my garage, that's where half the meat of it all is.
I've been given some goggles, and now I can use that to scan things like my car. Figure out what's the damage condition, what tools and kits I need. Very specific stuff, lots of micromanaging and manhandling while there's radiation storms and floating ships lurking about.
It's not an adrenaline rush of a game, it's an anxiety rushing one. The need to be carefully stepping into each zone, driving past certain things, and sometimes stopping to scan them for research of course. But also, looting abandoned facilities and houses for loot. Emphasis on loot.
What drove me is, I guess the sight seeing, the visuals in the game are amazing. And the sense of discovery is unmatched with many other games out there. It highlights the zone as this special government project on a town, decrepit, abandoned and filled with the weirdest and creepiest things around. It can be pretty unsettling, but getting used to it, it's addictive.
I am literally driving a station wagon, collecting parts, and oh, get this, I can't drive back after am done. I need to collect anchor that is filled with energy, then use that to open a portal before going back to my garage Back To The Future style. You liking what you see yet?
That's not mentioning the car repairs I have to do when coming back, refueling, charging up the battery, and getting all my gear before I set off again. Can you imagine if I got stuck? Yeah that can happen. There are maps or junctions with no gateway exit.
Remember the anxiety part? Well, I used a scrapper I manufactured from well earned loot to get stuff, before I see some flying drone magnetizing my car and dragging it god knows where. And then there's the storms. Another thing to note, it's also designed like a roguelite. Basically I have to make sure I get everything I need, because other things starts brewing up.
So the big objective that I have, is that a bunch of people are stuck here. I don't know them that well, but personality wise, they're interesting people. I mean that, but outside of the great characterization and dialogues, I kind of wanted to know where they were taking me.
All of that while strolling around each of the junction. The other fun is finding the anomalies out there or structures and scanning them. That becomes useful for the blueprint station, which basically gives me this tube each time with a blueprint for things.
Now, the other fun part. Is unlocking things, the blueprint station allows up stuff in my garage like radars for scanning zone junctions, extra lockers, parts disassembler, sewing machine for upgrading my backpack, and so on. But the best part, is upgrading my car. I can pick apart the bumpers, doors, panels, and install better ones. I can also unlock car abilities like handbraking, shielding and so on.
It is, and I cannot stress this enough, exhausting work. But, I keep going and just keep going. I feel like, everything I've struggled with, and more inside and out there, paid in dividends. It satiated my Sci-Fi curiosity, it captures the spirit of adventuring with unknown perils even.
As I continue to explore the map, finding more junctions to drive around, I get closer to finishing the main story. It's being told that all of this is happening due to gamma-radiation accident that led to extreme hallucinations. As Oppy would tell me, the one being in charge.
I mean, there's recordings spread all over, and considering the procedurally generated nature of each map, changing every visit, it adds to the difficulty further. Look, if you're going to take your aspirin or some relaxants before playing this, you should. It is downright difficult, driving on terrain is also scary, unless offroad tires and a faster engine is installed. That's progress, baby!
Ok, jokes aside. The game can get lonely, and sometimes downright scary as well. I mean, I do have my radio to keep me distracted. But I have to stop by places by pulling the car to park and to conserve battery, turning the keys to power down. But it's not time efficient. Thus the trade-offs.
Some of the facilities are locked and needs prybars to break the locks or an impact hammer for hardlocks, and I can craft that at the back of my car, but if I don't have resources, I am screwed. Imagine a bigger horror when a junction condition is anchor obstruction.
That means I have to look around the map, drive over for minutes, maybe over an hour even to find enough anchors and deposit them before opening a gataway out of there. And that is before a storm approaches. If my car was well equipped, and I made the right suit, I could have survived the drastic condition changes, but no, I am Speedy Gonzales and am gone for good.
The sad part is, it's not a well-tested game. It's not that its janky at times, it's not that there's controller response issues. This one has serious performance problems. It eats up my GPU like crazy, memory temps go upwards to 90 degrees.
And I am wondering why it doesn't have any upscale software like FSR or DLSS. This one also had a bit of a rough launch, with some quest bugs here and there. But dear lord, I lose my graphics card because of this, I will have a fit. Because I keep coming back to it again and again, am now 12hrs in.
And I made it into the mid-zone. This is Ghostbusters in Chernobyl now, it's stage 2 where the gooey stuff is at. More UFOs, and more unpredictable phenomenon as well. And the best part, unstable anchor. There's actually 3 types of those, and this zone 2 here is where now I can get the serious hardware for my car. Insulated car build here I come!
Lastly, don't be intimidated by the game, if you want an easy mode, there are accessibility options that tone the overall difficulty down. Some of it has helped me play the game all the way as well. Most of them won't even affect achievements either.
It's a high quality production. Like, almost all the way. The graphics is insanely amazing to look at, the voice acting is done well, the radio music isn't bad for 90s stuff as well, and despite the steep learning curve at first, I got through fine. Just keep an open mind as well.
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLzsebDqN2huHz0hdNqli_TQxlFVRsTP0c
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